Remnants of Lee soak South, threaten Northeast

Brandon Franklin picks up a tar ball washed in by Tropical Storm Lee from amid shells at Gulf Shores, Ala., on Tuesday, Sept. 6, 2011. Franklin, coastal plans manager for the city, said the tar balls are suspected of being pieces of submerged tar mats left over from the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Officials said Tuesday that they plan to test the black and brown globs to find out if they're related to last year's oil spill.

Disorganized yet deadly, the leftovers from Tropical Storm Lee spread farther inland Tuesday, soaking much of the East Coast. Areas still drying out from Irene were hit with more rain while farmers in the Southeast welcomed the wet weather.

CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. — Disorganized yet deadly, the leftovers from Tropical Storm Lee spread farther inland Tuesday, soaking much of the East Coast. Areas still drying out from Irene were hit with more rain while farmers in the Southeast welcomed the wet weather.

Lee spawned tornadoes, flooded roads and homes, uprooted trees and knocked out power to hundreds of thousands of people. Winds from the storm had fanned wildfires in Louisiana and Texas, though calmer air Tuesday was expected to help firefighters. Lee even kicked up tar balls on the Gulf Coast.

At least four people died in the storm.

Lee formed just off the Louisiana coast late last week and gained strength as it lingered in the Gulf for a couple of days. It dumped more than a foot of rain in New Orleans, testing the city's pump system for the first time in years. The storm then trudged across Mississippi and Alabama. By Tuesday, it had collided with a cold front leaving much of the East Coast wet, with unseasonably cool temperatures.

At one point, flood watches and warnings were in effect from northeast Alabama through West Virginia to New England. Heavy rain bands scattered across the central Appalachians and Northeast. The National Weather Service said 4 to 8 inches of rain were possible, with isolated downpours up to 10 inches.

In Mississippi and Louisiana, officials closely watched rivers that were at or above flood stage. Terrebonne Parish, La., levee director Reggie Dupre said an inspection of 200 miles of levee revealed about 24 homes and businesses took on water.

"They got whacked pretty bad," he said.

In New Jersey, where many residents were still cleaning up after Hurricane Irene, the remnants of Lee were expected to drop anywhere from 2 to 5 inches of rain. Officials were not expecting any new major flooding but they were keeping an eye on the saturated grounds and still-bulging rivers.

Lee's damage paled in comparison with Irene, though. At least 46 deaths were blamed on that storm, millions lost power and the damage was estimated in the billions of dollars.

Still, Lee was an unprecedented storm in some places. In Chattanooga, a one-day record for rainfall was set Monday with 8.16 inches. By Tuesday, 10 inches of rain had fallen in the state's fourth-largest city, which had its driest August ever with barely a drop of rain.

The soggy ground meant even modest winds were toppling trees onto homes and cars. A tree fell on a Chattanooga woman while she was moving her car, killing her, said police Sgt. Jerri Weary.

In suburban Atlanta, a man died after trying to cross a swollen creek near a dam. Authorities in Alabama called off the search for a missing swimmer presumed dead in the rough Gulf waters and in Mississippi, another man drowned while trying to cross a swollen creek in a car. Two people in the car with him were saved when an alert motorist nearby tossed them a rope.

There were other rescue stories, too. At a flooded apartment complex in Fort Oglethorpe in northwest Georgia, 33 people were saved by boat, Georgia Emergency Management Agency spokesman Ken Davis said.

The American Red Cross set up a shelter for them and other residents displaced in Mississippi, where damage was reported in at least 22 counties.

In Gulf Shores, Ala., black and brown chunks of tar ranging in size from marbles to baseballs washed up on the beach. Brandon Franklin, the city's coastal claims manager, said samples would be sent to Auburn University for chemical testing to determine if the tar is from last year's BP oil spill.

Oil from the spill had soiled Gulf Coast beaches during the summer tourist season a year ago, though officials said the tar balls found so far didn't compare with the thick oil found on beaches then.